©Courtesy of GKIDS Three of the biggest anime franchises share certain similarities. In Chainsaw Man, they fight devils, while in Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba they do indeed slay demons. In the case of Jujutsu Kaisen, human “Jujutsu Sorcerers” battle so-called “Curses,” demonic monsters that coalesce from the excess negative energy humans release into the…
©Courtesy of Sony Pictures Finland’s resiliency is amazing. They flat-out defeated the vastly larger Soviet Red Army in the First Winter War and essentially battled them to a draw in the Second. Aatmi Korpi was their not-so-secret weapon. According to his mythical backstory, after the Communists massacred Korpi’s family, the enraged Finnish commando launched a…
@Courtesy of Searchlight Pictures Phillip Vandarploeug is a husky American expat residing in a Tokyo apartment that qualifies as small, even by local standards. He ekes out a subsistence living working the absolute lowest acting jobs on the dramatic food chain. If anyone understands life’s disappointments, it would be him. Consequently, he quickly displays the…
@Courtesy of Netflix Thanks to the reforms of the Meiji Restoration, being a ronin (a masterless samurai, like Toshiro Mifune in Yojimbo) no longer looked so bad to old school warriors following the Bushido code. Even ronin had a level of status the new government denied the samurai, now called Shizoku. They lost their honor…
@Courtesy of Anniplex USA In the 1970s, they would have called Ubu Kamigori “bionic.” In the year 2099, she can be described as a biological-hybrid android reconstructed with Somadea technology. Regardless of the terminology, Kamigori did not ask for her new “enhanced” condition. Her new boss definitely took some creepy liberties, which is why their…
©Courtesy of GKIDS Honestly, animation was probably the only way to adapt Amélie Nothomb’s otherwise “unadaptable,” “biographical” novella. Describing the world as she supposedly saw it as a three-year-old toddler, her book-club-friendly The Character of Rain reads something like Look Who’s Talking in the style of Terrence Malick. Regardless, the title rugrat character has a…
©Courtesy of Sony Pictures Dating is never easy when you are sixteen, but it is especially hard for a Devil Hunter like Denji. Instead of attending high school, he spends his days patrolling the streets. Technically, he hunts devils, rather than the demons of other famous anime (and KPop) franchises, but it is the same…
©Courtesy of GKIDS A Danish princess is about to discover “The Undiscovered Country.” That metaphor for the mysteries of the afterlife, taken from Shakespeare’s Hamlet, previously inspired the sixth (and probably best) original Star Trek film. It also could have very easily served as the title for Mamoru Hosoda’s new anime feature. The title character’s…
©Courtesy of GKIDS When asked why he runs, a junior high track star replies “to win,” as if it’s a stupid question, but it isn’t. In fact, several Japanese track stars at various stages of their careers must wrestle with that question throughout this film, especially during losing streaks. Yet, they keep running in Kenji…
©Courtesy of Sony Pictures Instead of ghost-busting, demon-slaying could be the top movie profession of the 2020’s. Five years before the KPop Demons Hunters became a breakout sensation, the Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba anime franchise (based on Koyoharu Gotouge’s manga) released the #1 global box-office champion of 2020. Admittedly, that year came with an…
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